Thursday, June 12, 2014

There are some days when no matter how many projects you have in mind, or how many projects you’ve got started on you just can’t seem to work up the energy to get on with them all.

Today, dear readers, I have that problem. To be honest I’ve felt like this for about a week. Its not that I don’t have plenty of ideas for posts, or crafts or projects, I just can’t to seem to muster the motivation to get them done.

Here’s all the things I have in mind:

In honour of the World Cup, a Brazilian recipe from a friend in Brazil. I’m still waiting for the recipe and then I will have to make it.

A yellow cushion cover. I’ve bought the fabric, zip and decoration and even cut out the pieces. They are just sitting on my work table waiting for me to put them together.

Plans for my balcony. I have some rough ideas, but I really wanted to put them down on paper to show you all.

A Baby-Shower present. I wanted to show you how to make a baby shower present, which I can’t describe in detail as the receiver will most likely read this.

I’m hoping to be able to interview another of my crafty friends.

I’m also waiting to hear from Ms Ester who has a tutorial in mind for us here.

So you see that I have lots and lots of things to do and post about but so far I just can’t get myself motivated and doing all of these things.

I hope you can bear with me, and I’m sure that by Monday I will write about one of the things on my list.

Monday, June 09, 2014

You may not know this but I like to paint and draw. I’m not bad, although I would never attempt to call myself an artist, or try and persuade people to buy my work, I paint because I enjoy it. Well, whilst browsing Pinterest I found some incredible photographs, that really blew my mind and since the likelihood of my owning such incredible photographs is remote I decided to copy one.Mrs Egeland’s Note: If the person who took the photograph is unhappy and feels I have taken a liberty by copying it and blogging about it I apologise. It was being sold on etsy.com, so please go there and have a look at the artist’s site.

Born Free…

Anyway, last weekend my darling husband took a man-cation, he went off for a weekend in the mountains with his bro (as in bro-mance). So I had the apartment all to myself, meaning I could eat exactly what I wanted, watch exactly what I wanted and do exactly what I wanted without worrying about if it fit in with him.
Oh the joys! I don’t know if all married women feel the same or if I am just horrible, but sometimes its nice not to have to worry about him, or what he wants once in a while.
So whilst enjoying my free time a little, I decided to take on the project of copying the above mentioned photo.
I had an old sketch I didn’t really want to keep anymore, so I painted it white and began.

I did a rough sketch of the basic shapes, then I realised I’d gone wrong and so I had to paint over the details that were misplaced and put them higher up. I also realised that some of my colours were too dark. So I changed them very slowly because it took me a while to get the colours I liked.
The next photos are how it progressed.

The last two photos are the finished painting and the original photo so you can see how they compare. I’m really happy with it. Of course its not as good as the original photograph, but I’m really pleased.

Vespa, The Italian Stallion

Vespa is iconic all on it’s own. From films like Roman Holiday with the ever fashionable and stylish Audrey Hepburn to Disney’s The Lizzie McGuire Movie with fashion forward if not quite as stylish Hilary Duff, it has pervaded our media. For me it represents the style of the 50’s, the Italian idea of la dolce niente (the sweet nothing), of freedom and fun. Its a lovable scamp that races around the streets of Rome looking for love and gelato. Whilst researching the Vespa I came across this:

I couldn't help but want to share this with you. I do love the Vespa, but what's not to love? With the painting I have brought a little of that Vintage style with all that the Vespa represents into my life and living room.
For more information on Vespa, there is a link above, and also Wikipedia has a lot of information too.